BT joins forces with 'free wifi' network FON [BT broadband office]

BT joins forces with 'free wifi' network FON

Posted 9 October 2007 at 8:17AM by Simon Dickson in Announcements

Like the sound of free wireless internet access, near enough worldwide? The deal announced last week between BT and FON is absolutely huge, in geographic terms, if nothing else.

FON, if you've never heard of them before, started in Spain with a simple concept. Free wifi worldwide, on a quid pro quo basis. You share your bandwidth with me, and I'll share mine with you. Each member - or 'fonero' - agrees to share a small portion of their home broadband connection, by opening up a separate, secure channel on their wireless router. In return, you're able to share the connection of any other community member. Of course, there's a catch: a lot of ISPs don't let you share your bandwidth connection with other people.

With BT on board - and indeed, literally on the board - the 3 million people with BT consumer Total Broadband will be invited to join the FON community, which already offers 190,000 hotspots worldwide. It isn't going to be forced on anyone: as BT's Gavin Patterson points out, 'We are giving our customers a choice and an opportunity.' But with the offer of free wifi wherever you happen to travel, it's surely very appealing. You can rest safe in the knowledge that BT's research labs helped developed the system's security, and you might even make a few quid out of it, if a non-member pays to use your connection.

There's more information on Fon's blog, or in a BT press release. You can also read the thoughts of chief Fonero Martin Varsavsky on his personal blog.

Tags: bt, fon, free, wifi

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Comments

1. At October 9, 2007 12:15 PM, alastair wrote:

is this safe in terms of security? if everyone connects to the same access points/ shared networks surely they will be more open to hacking/virus spread than private networks?

or is there something to prevent that other than a firewall on your pc's which if hackers want past it they will keep trying?

2. At October 9, 2007 12:21 PM, Jonathan wrote:

Sounds interesting. Does it give you the info to tell you how to create a channel specifically for this?

3. At October 9, 2007 2:04 PM, anjanesh wrote:

FON network uses a seperate FON router which you have to buy.
As far as i undertstood that is daisy chained into your exisiting router. So the seperate channel in fact is sourced from the FON router and your basic wireless connection stays secure.

The FON router provides gateway for FON users; you can also earn money if you are sharing the connection.

4. At October 10, 2007 4:49 PM, Adrian wrote:

It doesn't have to be a separate router. Some routers have the ability to segregate wireless traffic onto a separate VLAN. Your home/office network is perfectly safe from snooping in its own broadcast domain.

5. At October 11, 2007 1:44 PM, Anjanesh wrote:

Adrian - just curious to know if common home routers(Linksys/Belkin/D-Link/2wire/voyager etc ) support VLAN .
Could you explain which ones do ?

6. At October 14, 2007 6:51 PM, Tanvir Ahmad wrote:

Think it's a great idea. I am always on the move and spend a lot on openzone vouchers. But unfortuantely, I do not have BT Broadband and have to wait for a router to purchase. God knows when this will be available though!

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